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MASTERS  IN  ART 


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MAHTI-iliH  IN  Ain  I'l.ATK  I 

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PUKTKAIT  OF  GKEUZE  BY  HIMSELF  LOUVHE.  PAHIS 

Greuze  was  of  medium  height,  and  distinguished  in  appearance.  His  head  was  well 
formed,  his  forehead  high,  his  eyes  large  and  bright,  and  his  expression  frank  and 
ingenuous.  He  wore  his  hair  in  curls  on  either  side  of  his  face,  and  being  fond  of 
dress  and  finery  frequently  affected  striking  and  gay-colored  clothes.  The  portrait 
here  reproduced  was  painted  by  the  artist  late  in  life,  and  is  one  of  the  best  examples 
of  his  skill  in  portraiture.  His  hair  is  powdered,  and  he  wears  a blue  coat,  gray  vest, 
and  loosely  knotted  white  cravat. 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


BORN  172  5;  DIED  1805 
FRENCH  SCHOOL 


JEAN-BAPTISTE  GREUZE  was  born  at  Tourniis,  P rance,  on  August 
21,  1725.  His  father,  a master-mason  anti  builder  by  trade,  was  desirous 
that  his  son,  who,  when  only  eight  years  old  showed  a decided  talent  for 
drawing,  should  adopt  architecture  as  his  profession;  but  the  boy  had  set  his 
heart  upon  becoming  a painter,  and  no  arguments  or  threats  could  shake  him 
in  his  determination.  All  his  spare  moments  were  devoted  to  sketching,  any 
stray  piece  of  paper  or  even  a whitewashed  wall  being  sufficient  to  tempt 
his  pencil.  When  forbidden  by  his  father  to  waste  his  time  thus,  Jean-Bap- 
tiste,  by  no  means  obedient  to  his  parent’s  wishes,  persistently  exercised  his 
skill  in  secret,  drawing  and  sketching  in  his  own  room  long  after  he  was 
supposed  to  be  abed  and  asleep.  Finally  a pen-and-ink  copy  of  a head  of 
St.  James  which  he  gave  to  his  father  as  a birthday  present,  and  which  was 
so  skilfully  executed  that  it  was  mistaken  for  an  engraving,  convinced  the 
elder  Greuze  that  his  son’s  talent  justified  the  boy  in  his  wish  to  be  an  art- 
ist; and  accordingly  Jean-Baptiste  was  sent  to  Lyons,  where  he  became  a 
pupil  of  Grandon,  a portrait-painter  of  that  place. 

Grandon’s  studio  was  a veritable  picture-factory,  and  (jreuze,  taught  to 
work  with  more  speed  than  excellence,  was  expected  to  produce  a finished 
picture  each  day.  As  a result,  he  became  disgusted  with  this  mechanical 
method,  and,  conscious  of  powers  which  he  longed  to  display  in  a broader 
field,  decided  to  go  to  Paris  and  try  his  fortune  in  the  city  where  so  many 
had  gone  before  him,  equally  hopeful,  ecpially  ambitious,  and  etjually  destitute. 

P'ew  details  of  Greuze’s  early  life  in  Paris  are  known.  He  does  not  seem 
to  have  attached  himself  to  any  studio  nor  to  have  studied  under  any  master, 
but  to  have  worked  alone  and  in  obscurity,  earning  a living  as  best  he  could 
by  the  exercise  of  his  profession,  which  he  pursued  in  spite  of  hardships  and 
discouragements.  In  the  course  of  time  we  hear  of  him  at  the  Academy, 
where  he  studied  drawing  under  Natoire,  and  where  he  encountered  the  hos- 
tility and  jealousy  of  his  fellow-students,  who  so  hurt  the  pride  and  self-es- 
teem of  the  young  provincial  artist  by  the  lack  of  consideration  with  which 
they  treated  him  that  he  finally  complained  to  Silvestre,  director  of  the  Acad- 


24 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


emy.  Struck  by  the  ability  that  the  young  man’s  studies  and  sketches  dis- 
played, Silvestre  forthwith  agreed  to  have  his  portrait  painted  by  Greuze  — a 
commission  which  gave  the  painter  a certain  notoriety.  It  was  owing,  too, 
to  the  protection  and  patronage  of  Silvestre  and  to  the  kindness  of  Pigalle, 
the  king’s  sculptor,  that  Greuze  was  later  accepted  as  a candidate  for  mem- 
bership in  the  Academy,  thereby  acquiring  the  right  to  exhibit  his  pictures 
at  the  annual  exhibitions,  or  Salons,  held  by  that  body. 

At  about  this  time  (17  55)  Greuze  had  the  good  fortune  to  attract  the  at- 
tention of  a rich  and  influential  amateur,  M.  de  la  Live  de  Jully,  by  a picture 
that  he  had  painted  some  time  previously,  entitled  ‘A  Father  Reading  the 
Bible  to  his  Children.’  This  work  was  bought  by  M.  de  Jully,  who  invited 
the  artists  and  art-lovers  of  Paris  to  his  house  to  see  his  new  acquisition. 
Its  success  was  immediate, and  Greuze  suddenly  found  himself  famous.  When 
exhibited  at  the  Salon  of  1755  the  picture  attracted  the  attention  and  aroused 
the  enthusiasm  of  all.  Nothing  of  the  kind  had  been  seen  in  Paris;  and  people 
crowded  around  the  canvas  to  study  each  detail  of  this  portrayal  of  humble 
life,  that  was  as  different  from  the  pompous  and  grandiose  pictures  of  the 
court-painters,  in  which  royalty  was  wont  to  figure  under  the  guise  of  some 
Greek  or  Roman  hero,  as  from  the  Arcadian  scenes  and  ‘Fetes  galantes’  of 
Watteau  and  his  followers,  or  the  frivolous  and  sensual  allegories  of  Boucher. 

T his  picture  by  Greuze,  in  which  a venerable  peasant  propounds  the  Scrip- 
tures to  his  family,  tells  a moral  story  that  coincided  so  exactly  with  the  ideas 
contained  in  the  dramas  of  Diderot,  a well-known  writer  of  that  period  in 
France,  that  it  was  no  wonder  that  the  painter  who  had  sprung  so  suddenly 
into  notice  should  have  been  spoken  of  as  “a  pupil  of  Diderot.”  And  Dide- 
rot, advocating  that  art  should  be  devoted  to  the  cause  of  morality,  that  to 
make  virtue  attractive  and  vice  repulsive  “was  the  duty  of  every  honest  man 
who  could  wield  pen,  brush,  or  chisel,”  was  loud  in  his  praise  of  Greuze, 
whose  fame  was  vastly  increased  by  these  eulogies. 

Towards  the  end  of  this  year,  Greuze,  now  thirty  years  old,  went  to 
Italy  with  the  Abbe  Gougenot,  who  defrayed  the  expenses  of  the  tour;  but 
although  he  studied  diligently  during  the  two  years  that  were  spent  in  Italy, 
he  was  too  thoroughly  French  to  acquire  anything  of  the  Italian  manner. 
The  principal  occurrence  that  marked  this  period  of  his  career  was  a love- 
affair  with  a young  Roman  lady,  Laetitia,  the  beautiful  daughter  of  the  Duke 
del  Orr . . . , to  whom  the  painter  had  been  given  a letter  of  introduction. 
Cordially  received  by  the  duke,  Greuze  was  engaged  by  him  to  give  lessons  in 
painting  to  his  daughter;  and  before  long  the  two  young  people  had  fallen  in 
love  with  each  other,  and  Greuze,  fully  aware  of  the  hopelessness  of  his 
attachment  to  one  so  far  above  him  in  station,  was  plunged  into  so  melan- 
choly a mood  that  he  won  for  himself  among  his  fellow-students  the  title  of 
“the  lovesick  cherub,”  a title  which  his  light  curly  hair  and  boyish  appear- 
ance made  especially  applicable.  Laetitia,  fearing  that  her  affection  was  un- 
requited, was  equally  in  despair,  but  upon  an  avowal  of  love  which  she 
wrung  from  the  painter  her  gay  spirits  returned,  and  it  was  long  before  Greuze 
could  convince  her  that  all  must  be  at  an  end  between  them.  Her  reproaches 

[66] 


GREUZE 


25 


were  hard  to  bear,  and  more  than  once  the  lover  almost  yielded  to  her  per- 
suasions that  they  should  elope.  Finally,  however,  feigning  an  illness  that 
later  became  genuine,  Greuze  firmly  resisted  all  temptation  to  see  Lstitia; 
and  it  was  only  at  the  request  of  her  father,  who  wished  him  to  paint  her 
portrait,  that  upon  his  recovery  he  again  visited  the  palace.  Three  months 
had  meantime  gone  by,  and  Laetitia’s  hand  had  been  promised  in  marriage  to 
a young  nobleman  chosen  by  her  father  as  a suitable  husband  for  her;  and 
Greuze,  heart-broken,  left  Rome,  secretly  carrying  with  him  a copy  of  the 
portrait  that  he  had  painted  of  her  whom  he  had  so  hopelessly  loved. 

Upon  his  return  to  Paris  he  devoted  himself  to  his  art  more  assiduously 
than  ever.  Among  the  list  of  his  pictures  for  the  year  17  57  are  many  that 
bear  Italian  names  and  in  which  the  figures  are  dressed  in  Italian  costumes, 
but  beyond  this  the  influence  of  Italy  is  not  perceptible  in  his  work,  and  in- 
deed the  only  foreign  influence  ever  to  be  observed  there  is  that  of  the  great 
Flemish  master,  Rubens,  for  whose  pictures  Greuze  entertained  an  unbounded 
admiration,  frequently  gaining  permission  to  study  those  that  were  at  that 
time  in  the  Luxembourg  Palace,  where,  mounted  on  a ladder  that  he  might 
observe  them  at  close  range,  he  would  spend  hours. 

In  addition  to  his  subject  pictures,  Greuze  exhibited  at  this  time  several 
portraits  and  the  first  of  his  numerous  representations  of  heads  of  young  girls 
and  children,  upon  which  his  fame  to-day  especially  rests.  In  1761  he  sent 
a picture  to  the  Salon  that  vied  in  popularity  with  his  painting  of ‘A  Father 
Reading  the  Bible  to  his  Children,’  exhibited  six  years  before.  This  was 
‘The  Village  Bride’  ( ‘L’Accordee  de  Village’),  which  created  a sensation  in 
Paris  and  called  forth  a gushing  rhapsody  from  Diderot. 

The  success  of  this  picture  confirmed  Greuze  in  the  direction  of  his  art — 
the  representation  of  moral  scenes  from  the  life  of  the  lower  classes — and 
from  that  time  he  was  indefatigable  in  his  search  for  such  subjects,  finding 
them  in  the  streets  and  market-places  of  Paris,  on  the  quays,  in  the  little  cafes 
of  the  boulevards  which  he  visited  in  the  evenings, sketch-book  in  hand — any- 
where, in  short,  where  he  could  observe  the  life  of  the  people.  His  desire  was 
to  paint  a series  of  twenty-six  pictures  after  the  fashion  of  the  English  Ho- 
garth, in  illustration  of  a narrative  of  his  own  composition  entitled  ‘Basil  and 
Theobald,  or  the  Two  Educations.’  This  project  was  never  carried  out,  but 
an  idea  of  its  intended  style  may  be  deduced  from  the  two  companion  pic- 
tures now  in  the  Louvre,  painted  at  about  this  time,  ‘The  Eather’s  Curse’ 
and  ‘The  Punished  Son.’ 

Greuze  was  now  the  fashion,  and  orders  for  his  works  poured  in  upon 
him  faster  than  they  could  be  filled.  Eortunate  and  prosperous  as  he  was  in 
his  profession,  however,  his  home  life  was  anything  but  happy.  Soon  after 
his  return  from  Italy  he  had  been  attracted  by  Mademoiselle  Anne-Gabriellc 
Babuty,  the  daughter  of  a bookseller  in  Paris,  and  herself  in  charge  of  the 
little  book-shop  where  Greuze  first  made  her  acquaintance.  She  was  then 
somewhat  over  thirty  years  of  age,  and  possessed  of  a fine  figure,  a certain 
doll-like  beauty,  a pink-and-white  complexion,  and  an  innocent,  naive  ex- 
pression, which  captivated  the  fancy  of  the  painter,  always  susceptible  to  the 


26 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


charms  of  woman;  and  before  long,  by  the  scheming  of  Mademoiselle 
Babuty,  he  had  been  persuaded  into  a reluctant  marriage. 

At  first  all  went  well.  Greuze  frequently  painted  his  wife,  whose  beauty 
was  of  the  kind  most  pleasing  to  his  fancy,  introducing  her  portrait  into 
many  of  his  compositions.  Three  children  were  born,  of  whom  two  daughters 
lived  to  be  the  comfort  of  the  painter’s  old  age;  but  as  time  went  on  no  more 
wretchedly  unhappy  household  could  be  found  than  that  of  Greuze,  whose 
wife  made  his  life  miserable  by  her  extravagant  ways,  her  violent  temper  and 
neglect  of  her  children,  and  finally,  by  her  faithlessness  and  flagrant  immo- 
rality. Greuze  bore  his  trials  long  and  patiently,  but  at  last  in  despair  he  ob- 
tained the  legal  right  of  separation  from  his  wife. 

Jn  the  meantime,  a disappointment  embittered  for  a period  his  artistic 
career.  Although  many  years  had  gone  by  since  his  admission  as  a candidate 
for  membership  in  the  Academy,  the  picture  which  the  rules  of  that  body  re- 
quired that  an  artist  should  paint  before  he  could  become  an  academician 
had  never  been  executed.  The  necessity  of  complying  with  the  rules  of  the 
Academy  was  brought  home  to  Greuze  by  a refusal  to  admit  any  more  of 
his  works  to  the  yearly  exhibitions  until  he  had  painted  the  requisite  picture, 
and  accordingly  he  now  set  to  work  upon  his  task;  but  as  the  full  honors  of 
membership  were  granted  only  to  a painter  of  history,  he  foolishly  selected 
a classic  subject,  utterly  foreign  to  his  talent,  ‘Septimius  Severus  rebuking 
his  son  Caracalla  for  having  attempted  his  Life.’ 

When  completed  the  work  was  submitted  to  the  members  of  the  Acad- 
emy while  Greuze  confidently  awaited  their  decision  in  an  adjoining  room. 
At  the  end  of  an  hour  he  was  summoned.  “Monsieur  Greuze,’’  said  the 
director,  addressing  him,  “you  have  been  received,  but  it  is  as  a painter  of 
genre.  The  Academy  has  considered  your  former  productions,  which  are  ex- 
cellent, but  has  closed  its  eyes  upon  this  picture,  which  is  worthy  neither  ot 
the  Academy  nor  of  you.’’ 

Greuze,  astounded  and  deeply  hurt,  attempted  to  defend  his  picture,  and 
even  carried  on  his  defence  later  in  the  newspapers;  but,  alas,  the  public 
echoed  the  opinion  of  the  Academy  and  even  Diderot  condemned  the  work. 
Diderot’s  fervor,  indeed,  had  cooled,  and  in  his  notice  of  the  Salon  of  17  69, 
the  date  of  Greuze’s  unfortunate  experience  with  the  Academy,  he  retracts 
much  of  the  extravagant  praise  previously  lavished  upon  the  painter,  curtly 
remarking,  “I  no  longer  care  for  Greuze.” 

From  the  day  of  this  humiliating  repulse  Greuze  was  at  daggers  drawn  with 
the  Academy,  and  refused  for  many  years  to  send  his  pictures  to  the  annual 
exhibitions.  He  even  left  Paris  and  lived  fora  time  in  Anjou.  When,  how- 
ever, he  returned  to  Paris  his  popularity  was  as  great  as  ever.  His  studio 
became  the  resort  of  the  fashionable  world.  The  Emperor  Joseph  ii.  and 
other  foreign  princes  made  it  a point  when  in  Paris  to  visit  the  famous 
Monsieur  Greuze;  the  Empress  of  Russia  invited  him  to  her  court — an 
invitation,  however,  which  he  did  not  accept — he  was  appointed  painter  to 
the  t rench  king,  and  assigned  an  apartment  in  the  Louvre.  High  prices  were 
paid  for  his  works,  notably  for  his  numerous  heads  of  young  girls  which  cap- 

[68] 


GREUZE 


27 


tivated  the  public  taste  and  added  immensely  to  his  reputation,  and  the  sale 
of  engravings  made  from  these  as  well  as  from  his  other  pictures  still  further 
increased  his  wealth.  Such  success  might  well  have  turned  the  head  of  a 
stronger  man  than  Greuze,  who,  notoriously  vain  and  easily  flattered,  was 
intoxicated  by  the  adulation  he  received.  Sometimes  he  made  himself  ridic- 
ulous by  his  bombast  and  foolish  conceit.  “O  monsieur,”  he  would  ex- 
claim, pointing  to  one  of  his  own  works,  “here  is  a picture  that  astonishes 
even  me  who  painted  it.  It  is  perfectly  incomprehensible  how  with  merely 
a few  bits  of  pounded  earth  a man  can  put  so  much  life  into  a canvas.  Really, 
if  these  were  the  days  of  mythology  I should  fear  the  fate  of  Prometheus!” 

“He  is  a little  yain,  our  painter,”  wrote  Diderot,  “but  his  yanity  is  that 
of  a child  — the  intoxication  of  genius.  Take  his  naivete  from  him  and  you 
take  away  his  spirit;  the  fire  would  be  extinguished  and  all  his  charm  gone.  I 
very  much  fear  that  when  Greuze  becomes  modest  there  will  no  longer  be 
any  reason  for  his  being  so.”  Not  every  one,  however,  took  so  charitable  a 
view  of  the  painter’s  exaggerated  self-esteem  as  did  Diderot,  and  many  of  his 
fellow  artists  were  irritated  by  his  inordinate  conceit.  On  one  occasion  the 
Marquis  de  Marigny,  an  authority  in  the  artistic  world  of  Paris,  as  he  passed 
through  the  rooms  of  the  Salon  followed  by  his  usual  train  of  artists,  paused 
before  a picture  by  Greuze  and  turning  to  the  painter  exclaimed,  “That  is 
beautiful  I ” “I  know  it,  monsieur,”  replied  Greuze  with  his  customary  com- 
placency; “moreover,  every  one  praises  me;  and  yet  I am  in  need  of  com- 
missions.” Whereupon,  Joseph  Vernet,  the  marine  painter,  who  was  pres- 
ent, addressing  Greuze  said,  “That  is  because  you  have  a host  of  enemies, 
and  among  them  one  who,  although  he  loves  you  to  distraction,  will  never- 
theless be  your  ruin.”  “And  who  is  that?”  asked  the  painter.  “Yourself,” 
was  the  reply. 

Easily  flattered,  Greuze  was  as  easily  offended  by  any  adverse  criticism 
of  his  work.  The  famous  Madame  GeofFrin,  at  whose  house  all  the  wit  and 
fashion  of  Paris  were  wont  to  congregate,  once  described  a picture  of  his 
representing  a young  mother  surrounded  by  her  numerous  offspring  as  “a 
fricassee  of  children.”  Greuze  never  forgave  her.  “ What  does  she  mean  by 
criticizing  such  a work  of  art!”  he  cried.  “J.et  her  beware,  or  I will  paint 
her  as  a school-mistress,  rod  in  hand,  so  that  children  for  all  time  shall  look 
upon  her  with  terror.” 

Hut  although  irritated  by  what  he  considered  disparagement  of  his  talent, 
and  at  times  brusque  and  rude  in  his  manner,  Greuze  was,  as  a rule,  an  agree- 
able companion.  His  conversation  was  elevated  in  tone,  and  when  speakitig 
on  the  subject  of  his  art,  in  which  he  was  absorbed,  he  became  animated  and 
even  elotpicnt.  In  his  intercourse  with  women,  in  whose  society  he  ttu>k 
great  delight,  he  was  invariably  gracious  and  charming,  and  praise  from  women 
was  especially  acceptable  to  his  selt-love. 

For  twenty-five  years  Greuze  was  the  fashionable  painter  of  Paris.  C’ourted 
by  the  rich  and  influential,  popular  as  well  among  the  lower  classes,  to  which 
his  work  so  strongly  appealed,  he  was  at  the  height  of  his  success  when  sud- 
denly the  Revolution  swept  like  a wave  over  Paris,  bringing  tlestruction  to  the 


28 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


old  order  ot  things  and  engulfing  the  fortunes  of  thousands.  Greuze  lost  all 
that  he  possessed.  Even  his  glory  had  waned,  for  the  star  of  David  had  arisen, 
and  at  once  the  fickle  taste  of  the  public  turned  to  the  new  art  that  he  rep- 
resented— the  classic,  severe,  and  “antique-heroical” — and  away  from  the 
moral  scenes  and  pretty  faces  painted  by  the  artist  who  but  yesterday  had 
been  its  idol.  Greuze,  in  short,  had  outlived  the  movement  in  art  of  which 
he  had  been  the  interpreter.  Neglected,  almost  forgotten,  he  realized  that  his 
day  was  over.  In  spite,  however,  of  every  discouragement,  he  worked  on  in- 
defatigably  to  the  end.  The  pension  that  had  been  granted  him  by  the  king 
came  to  an  end  with  the  cessation  of  royal  authority,  and  at  seventy-five  he 
was  reduced  to  the  utmost  poverty.  The  touching  appeal  that  he  addressed 
to  the  Minister  of  the  Interior  tells  of  his  changed  fortunes.  “The  picture 
that  I am  painting  for  the  government,”  he  writes,  “is  only  half  finished,  but 
my  circumstances  are  such  that  I am  forced  to  ask  you  to  pay  me  part  of 
the  money  in  advance,  that  I may  be  enabled  to  go  on  with  the  work.  . . . 
I have  lost  everything  but  my  talent  and  my  courage.  I am  seventy-five 
years  old  and  I have  not  a single  order  for  a picture.  It  is  the  saddest  hour 
of  all  my  life.” 

On  the  twenty-first  of  March,  1805,  Greuze  died  at  the  age  of  eighty 
years.  To  the  last  he  had  retained  the  affection  and  regard  of  a few  faithful 
pupils  and  the  devotion  of  one  of  his  daughters,  who  lived  with  him.  It  is 
said  that  when  Napoleon  heard  of  his  death  he  exclaimed,  “Dead!  Poor  and 
neglected!  Why  did  he  not  speak.?  I would  gladly  have  given  him  a pitcher 
of  Sevres  filled  with  gold  for  every  copy  ever  made  of  his  ‘Broken  Pitcher.’” 


%i)e  art  of  (®mije 

CHARLESNORMAND  ‘J.B.  GREUZE’ 

IN  his  own  day  Greuze  was  all  the  fashion.  From  the  time  of  Boucher  to 
that  of  David,  his  works  aroused  an  enthusiasm  that  was  beyond  their 
deserts.  But,  notwithstanding  the  enthusiasm  of  the  public,  his  contempo- 
raries saw  clearly  just  where  the  weakness  of  this  so  much  vaunted  painter 
lay;  and  Diderot’s  estimate  of  him,  if  all  its  qualifications — all  its  “buts”  and 
“howevers”  — be  included,  would,  after  all,  form  quite  a comprehensive  crit- 
icism of  Greuze,  for  in  his  various  notices  of  the  artist’s  pictures  he  has 
pointed  out  his  monotony  and  artificiality,  the  dryness  of  his  inspiration,  his 
carelessness  in  the  drawing  of  draperies,  his  excessive  use  of  purplish  tones, 
and  many  other  things. 

Diderot  says  that  one  day  while  visiting  La  Tour,  the  famous  pastellist, 
he  asked  La  Tour  why  it  was  that  in  so  charming  a picture  as  the  ‘Little 
Girl  with  the  Dog’  by  Greuze,  where  the  painter  had  so  admirably  succeeded 
in  the  difficult  art  of  painting  flesh,  he  had  not  been  able  to  paint  linen,  for 
that  the  drapery  falling  over  one  of  the  girl’s  arms  was  like  a piece  of  stone 
furrowed  out  to  resemble  folds.  “The  reason,”  answered  La  Tour,  “is  also 

[7  01 


GREUZE 


29 


the  cause  of  many  other  and  more  important  faults,  which  all  come  from 
teaching  pupils  to  embellish  nature  before  they  have  learned  to  know  what 
nature  really  is,  so  that  when  it  comes  to  any  faithful  delineation  of  details 
they  are  completely  at  sea.” 

This  was  the  case  wdth  Greuze.  La  Tour’s  words  applied  to  his  work 
explain  the  relative  depreciation  which  it  has  undergone,  and  from  which  its 
good  qualities,  however  real  they  may  be,  have  not  been  able  to  save  it. 
First  of  all,  his  principal  fault — the  prevailing  fault,  indeed,  of  his  century — 
is  that  he  is  artificial:  artificial  in  the  choice  of  his  moral  subjects,  which 
attained  their  excessive  popularity  because  they  responded  to  a passing  state 
of  mind  which  for  us  of  the  present  day  has  only  a historic  interest;  artificial 
in  his  attempt  to  preach  morality  by  means  of  art,  which  in  preoccupying 
itself  with  an  end  foreign  to  its  nature  overlooks  its  own  proper  aim  and 
object — itself.  This  attempt  led  the  painter  to  appeal  to  the  eye  of  the  spec- 
tator by  means  of  a wholly  scenic  arrangement,  in  which  antitheses  jar  upon 
one,  and  in  which  the  exaggerated  gestures  and  melodramatic  attitudes  are 
far  more  unnatural  than  any  seen  upon  the  stage.  . . . 

In  addition  to  this  absence  of  sincerity  there  is  great  sameness  in  his  works, 
a sameness  that  results  from  the  paucity  of  his  imagination.  Never  did  a 
painter  repeat  himself  more  persistently  or  more  zealously.  Having  seen  a 
few  carefully  selected  samples  of  his  works  we  know  them  by  heart;  there 
is  no  fear  that  he  will  ever  take  us  by  surprise.  Blondes  or  brunettes,  with  a 
ribbon  in  the  hair  and  a bouquet  of  flowers  in  the  bosom,  his  young  girls  are 
all  the  same;  or,  at  least,  the  family  resemblance  among  them  is  so  strong 
that  there  is  no  mistaking  them.  The  same  may  be  said  of  his  puffy  little 
urchins,  of  his  lean  and  bony  old  men,  and  of  his  blooming  young  mothers 
surrounded  by  their  numerous  offspring.  There  is  nothing  more  irritating 
and  tiresome  than  this  unfruitful  abundance,  so  to  speak,  forever  placing  in 
different  situations  three  or  four  figures  invariably  the  same. 

In  addition  to  these  faults  of  a general  nature,  there  are  others  in  Greuze’s 
work  which  more  especially  concern  his  technique.  We  have  seen  what  La 
'Four  and  even  Diderot  thought  of  the  lack  of  frankness  and  truth  in  his 
compositions;  he  was  also  reproached,  and  justly,  with  not  knowing  how  to 
paint  large  figures,  with  suspiciously  avoiding  the  nude,  with  not  paying  sut- 
ficicnt  heed  to  the  disparity  of  age  between  the  heads  and  the  bodies  of  his 
figures;  and,  finally,  he  was  accused  of  such  carelessness  in  painting  dra- 
peries that  they  resembled  plaster  casts.  In  regard  to  this  last  point,  how- 
ever, Greuze  seems  to  have  been  more  inclined  to  take  credit  to  himself  than 
to  try  to  correct  the  fault,  saying  that  he  neglected  the  draperies  intention- 
ally, the  better  to  bring  out  the  flesh-tones — an  ingenious  excuse,  which  he 
found  preferable  to  an  acknowledgment  of  inability.  Finally,  exception  might 
well  be  taken  to  the  lighting  of  his  pictures  — to  the  way  in  which  the  light 
is  scattered,  to  the  heavy  atmosphere  surrounding  his  figures,  to  the  whites, 
which  have  turned  to  dirty  gray,  to  the  stiffness  and  the  metallic  finish  of  his 
materials,  to  his  purplish  tones,  and  to  his  dull  backgrounds,  which  darken 
scenes  alreadv  insufficientlv  lighted.  . . . 


30 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


But,  after  all  is  said  and  done,  his  faults  and  his  failings  have  not  pre- 
vented Greuze  from  maintaining,  after  a passing  eclipse,  his  position  in  the 
estimation  of  connoisseurs.  The  reasons  for  this  are,  first  of  all,  that  he  is 
documentary.  I'hat  is  to  say,  he  marks  an  epoch  in  the  history  of  the  evo- 
lution of  ideas,  and  of  the  art  that  interprets  those  ideas  by  giving  them 
pictorial  form.  He  is  the  painter  of  the  period  overflowing  with  good  and 
generous  impulses  and  tender  emotions,  as  well  as  with  the  illusions  that  pre- 
ceded and  prepared  the  way  for  the  French  Revolution.  He  personified  a 
manner  of  thought  which,  carried  to  excess,  became  somewhat  ridiculous, 
but  which  had  its  excuse  in  the  lofty  ideal  for  which  it  stood.  Like  that  ideal, 
Greuze  is  theatrical  and  declamatory;  and  again,  in  accordance  with  that 
ideal,  he  preaches  love  for  the  humble  and  unfortunate,  practice  of  domestic 
virtues,  family  affection,  labor,  order,  economy — in  a word,  all  the  virtues  in 
which  the  strength  and  honor  of  the  middle  classes  in  France  still  consist.  In 
this  sense,  his  moral  scenes  have  a historic  value  that  would  alone  be  sufficient 
to  assure  him  a distinct  place  in  the  history  of  French  art  of  the  eighteenth 
century.  Another  reason  for  the  position  which  he  occupies  is  that  he  rep- 
resents a special  style  of  painting  that  was,  if  not  created,  at  least  revived 
by  him.  Every  new  state  of  society  calls  for  a new  kind  of  art,  and  that  art 
Greuze  tried  to  give  to  his  own  time.  Whether  he  succeeded,  or  whether 
he  was  prevented  from  succeeding  by  too  great  a deference  to  the  prevail- 
ing art  tendencies  of  the  day,  to  say  nothing  of  his  own  individual  tendencies 
as  well,  is  another  question.  He  painted  human  nature  as  he  conceived  it 
in  the  lower  classes,  giving  rights  of  citizenship  to  the  bourgeoisie,  to  peas- 
ants—to  all  those,  in  short,  whom  the  fastidious  taste  of  the  upper  and  fash- 
ionable class,  tbe  nobility,  had  until  then  banished  with  supercilious  scorn. 
He  did  not  wholly  accomplish  this,  it  is  true,  but  he  started  the  movement, 
and  was  the  first  to  open  up  the  path  and  to  attempt  a new  formula  for  the 
portrayal  of  the  world’s  sorrows  and  hopes.  Not  to  every  man  is  it  given  to 
be  an  initiator,  and  it  would  be  unjust  to  Greuze  were  he  denied  that  glory. 

There  are,  moreover,  other  and  more  technical  reasons  which  help  to  save 
his  name  from  oblivion.  He  had  an  unusual  gift  for  composition.  True 
there  is  bombast  in  his  moral  scenes,  but  there  is  also  movement  and  vigor; 
and  there  is  unity  in  the  action  which  animates  his  personages.  His  pictures 
of  familiar  every-day  subjects,  less  theatrical  than  the  others,  show  an  as- 
tonishing abundance  of  life.  No  one  understood  as  he  did  how  to  depict 
the  pretty  disorder  which  children  occasion  in  the  family  circle.  He  scarcely 
varied  his  compositions,  but  he  knew  how  to  arrange  them.  His  portraits, 
too,  are  well  composed,  and  in  recognizing  that  fact  no  slight  praise  is  awarded 
him. 

Greuze  has  still  other  qualities,  one  in  especial.  He  is  the  painter  par 
excelleyice  of  woman,  or,  more  strictly  speaking,  of  the  young  girl.  Man,  in 
his  achievement,  is  the  exception  ; the  young  girl  is  the  rule.  He  never  grows 
weary  of  her,  but  portrays  her  in  every  situation  and  in  every  attitude.  She 
is  always  the  same  and  always  charming.  He  paints  her  with  pure  love  of 
the  subject  and  in  a way  that  clearly  shows  that  in  his  eyes  she  is  the  most 

[72] 


GREUZE 


31 


important  thing  in  nature.  This  exclusive  passion  for  painting  young  girls 
of  that  uncertain  age  between  the  child  and  the  woman  added  immensely  to 
the  artist’s  reputation,  concentrating  the  admiration  of  the  public,  which  likes 
to  feel  sure  of  its  ground,  upon  one  single  point  in  his  work,  and  resulting 
in  the  creation  of  a type  of  young  girl  peculiar  to  him  and  to  which  his  name 
will  always  be  attached. 

A subject  that  is  dear  to  the  heart  of  a painter  is  sure  to  inspire  his  brush. 
So  it  is  with  Greuze  each  time  that  he  paints  the  red  lip  or  the  blushing 
cheek  of  a young  girl.  Although  as  a rule  unpardonably  careless  in  his  treat- 
ment of  draperies  and  accessories,  his  brush  lingers  lovingly  on  these  youthful 
faces,  so  full  of  health,  so  round  and  firm,  beautiful  as  flowers,  tempting  as 
ripe  fruit.  Dull  and  gray  at  other  times,  Greuze  is  in  these  pictures  a colorist; 
and  when  we  see  these  delicate  and  harmoniously  blended  tints  we  can  well 
understand  the  enthusiasm  they  aroused  in  a public  accustomed  to  the  sub- 
stitution of  rouge  and  paint  for  the  natural  colors  of  the  complexion. 

As  a matter  of  fact,  however,  Greuze  was  more  of  a draftsman  than  a 
colorist.  The  inexorable  school  of  David,  it  is  true,  found  that  his  drawing 
was  not  accurate,  his  modeling  weak,  and  that  the  bodies  of  his  figures  were 
not  always  definable  beneath  the  amplitude  of  their  drape,  ries.  Nevertheless, 
the  fact  remains  that  Greuze,  without  manifesting  the  impeccability  of  more 
recent  masters,  drew  when  he  so  wished  (especially  is  this  the  case  with  heads) 
correctly  and  accurately.  And  this  is  hardly  enough  to  say:  his  preliminary 
studies  have  a certain  personal  accent;  they  are  better,  indeed,  than  the  fin- 
ished figures  which  he  painted  from  them,  for  these  suffered  from  what  La 
Tour  called  “the  embellishment  of  nature.”  In  short,  Greuze’s  pencil  was 
truer  than  his  brush.  One  was  guided  by  the  daily,  incessant  observation  of 
the  artist;  the  other  obeyed  the  fashion,  and  was  subservient  to  the  influence 
of  superannuated  precepts  or  of  preoccupation  foreign  to  art. 

To  conclude : Jean-Haptiste  Greuze  is  a painter  of  the  second  order  whose 
position  among  the  foremost  of  his  time  was  due  to  a happy  chance.  T hat 
he  lived  when  he  did  was  his  good  fortune;  that  he  knew  how  to  profit  by 
the  fact  is  to  his  credit.  His  works  were  all  the  fashion  for  about  twenty-five 
years.  He  came  just  between  Boucher,  whose  day  was  over,  and  David,  who 
was  destined  to  revolutionize  all  the  traditions  of  the  French  school  of  paint- 
ing. Greuze  was  not  an  originator— the  familiar  scenes  that  he  portrayed 
were  no  novelty  after  those  painted  by  the  Flemish  and  the  Dutch;  he  merely 
revived  them  by  adapting  them  to  the  taste  of  his  day.  In  that  respect,  he 
became  the  interpreter  of  a special  condition  of  mind  which  fcniiui  in  him  its 
painter,  as  it  had  found  in  others  its  poets  or  its  philosophers.  Fo  personify 
an  epoch,  however  short  — a moment,  it  may  be,  in  the  busy  and  tumultuous 
life  of  a nation  like  France  — is  a piece  of  good  fortune  which  is  at  the  same 
time  a warrant  of  perpetuity.  Greuze  had  that  good  fortune  to  an  extent  tliat 
was,  perhaps,  beyond  his  deserts.  He  is  one  of  those  men  whom  one  cannot 
praise  highly  without  running  the  risk  of  over-praising,  and  whom  it  would 
be  etjually  unjust  to  disparage  to  the  point  of  contempt.  1 le  hail  the  ijualities 
of  a great  painter  along  with  faults  and  weaknesses  which  he  never  overcame. 


32 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


He  was  more  sentimental  than  feeling,  more  moral  than  pure,  more  declama- 
tory than  pathetic,  more  prolific  in  his  gift  than  fertile  in  his  fancy.  He  was 
moreover  a mediocre  painter  of  light,  understanding  but  imperfectly  the  man- 
agement of  chiaroscuro.  Compared  with  the  brilliant  colors  of  some  painters, 
his  palette  is  too  often  heavy,  gray,  and  monotonous.  But  for  all  that,  Greuze 
possesses  charm,  and  grace,  and  a delightful  freshness  that  he  seems  to  have 
borrowed  from  his  favorite  subjects — children  and  young  girls.  And  this  is 
sufficient  to  insure  him  a permanent  place  among  painters,  if  not  in  the  or- 
chestra itself,  at  least  in  the  front  rows  of  the  parquet. — from  the  french 

EDMOND  AND  JULES  DE  GONCOURT  ‘l’aRT  DU  XVIIl“®SIECLE’ 

TO  the  unethical  eyes  of  the  present  generation  it  has  become  apparent 
that  the  charm  of  Greuze,  his  true  talent,  his  originality,  and  his  strength 
are  evidenced  in  his  heads  of  children  and  young  girls,  and  almost  only  in 
them.  They  alone  serve  to  redeem  the  faults,  the  weaknesses,  and  the  defects 
of  color  so  apparent  in  his  large  pictures,  with  their  leaden  and  heavy  color 
schemes,  their  mixtures  of  purple  and  shot  hues,  their  uncertain  reds  and  dirty 
blues,  their  muddy  backgrounds,  and  their  opaque  shadows.  Indeed,  since 
these  story-telling  pictures  have  gone  out  of  fashion  it  would  seem  as  though 
the  light  had  faded  from  them. 

But  turn  to  one  of  Greuze’s  little  blonde  heads,  which  seems  lighted  by  a 
ray  of  sunlight  that  gleams  over  it  like  a caress,  and  we  feel  that  here  the 
brush  that  rounded  this  rosy  cheek,  modeled  this  smooth,  white  little  fore- 
head, gave  these  blue  eyes  the  light  of  the  sky,  softly  shadowed  the  delicately 
penciled  eyebrows,  and  set  the  cherub-bow  lips  between  the  soft  curve  of  the 
cheeks,  was  the  inspired  brush  of  a true  painter.  Surely  nothing  could  be 
fresher,  more  lifelike,  or  more  delicately  handled. 

Excelling  as  a delineator  of  childhood,  Greuze  was  a master  when  he 
painted  the  head  of  a young  girl,  and  an  unmatched  master  in  depicting  that 
transient  and  ephemeral  loveliness  wherein  the  woman’s  beauty  is  just  be- 
ginning to  work  its  wondrous  transformation  in  the  contours  of  the  child. 
With  what  adorable  lightness  does  he  paint  the  fleecy,  fly-away  locks  of  hair, 
vainly  confined  by  a ribbon,  the  shadowy  golden  down  where  the  forehead 
joins  the  hair,  the  delicate  network  of  blue  veins  that  branch  across  the  tem- 
ple! What  a slumberous  veiled  flame,  or  what  a swimming  glance,  he  gives 
the  eyes,  and  how  tremulously  sweet  is  the  look  when  a tear  hides  in  the 
lashes!  Indeed,  he  loved  all  the  signs  of  maiden  youthfulness — the  fine 
sensitive  nostrils,  the  bated  breath  that  half  opens  the  pouting  lips  with  vague 
wonder  and  aspiration. 

Glazings  strengthened  by  dashes  of  opaque  color,  rays  of  light  gleaming 
through  liquid  half-tones  and  sparkling  against  thin  under-tints — with  such 
slight  means  did  Greuze  evoke  on  his  canvases  those  fair,  rosy  faces,  the 
tender  warmth  of  flushed  and  downy  flesh,  those  slender  necks,  those  rounded 
shoulders  like  twin  doves,  and  those  little  breasts  that  catch  reflections  from 
the  gauzy  drapery  that  half  hides  them.  Such  pictures — happy  inspirations 
of  color — plainly  painted  because  of  the  artist’s  love  of  them,  recall  at  times 

[74] 


GREUZE 


53 


Rubens,  the  great  master  whose  genius  and  whose  secrets  Greuze  studied 
assiduously  tor  hours  together,  perched  upon  a ladder  in  the  Luxembourg 
Palace.  — from  the  french 

ARSENE  ALEXANDRE  ‘HISTOIRE  PO  PUL  A IRE  DE  LA  PEINTURE’ 

Greuze  painted  some  really  good  pictures  as  well  as  some  that  are  very 
poor,  if  not  actually  bad.  He  belongs  so  completely  to  his  own  day  that 
there  is  no  wonder  that  his  popularity  should  have  been  great  — far  greater, 
for  instance,  than  any  accorded  to  Chardin,  who  belongs  to  all  time. 

Greuze  had  a decidedly  individual  feeling  for  grace;  not  however  for  grace 
of  a simple  and  natural  kind.  His  heads  of  young  girls,  bewitching  as  they 
are  at  first  glance,  are,  as  a matter  of  fact,  artificial  and  affected.  His  best 
works,  however,  in  the  opinion  of  the  critical,  are  these  very  heads  of  young 
girls.  They  are,  indeed,  the  works  of  a true  painter,  whose  touch  is  delicate, 
and  who  has  selected  subjects  both  fresh  and  charming. 

After  all,  the  chief  reason  why  Greuze,  although  his  vogue  is  not  now 
what  it  once  was,  is  still  one  of  the  most  interesting  painters  of  his  centurv, 
is  that  he  owes  absolutely  nothing  to  any  other  artist.  His  color,  which  is 
often  inharmonious  and  commonplace,  his  drawing,  which  is  uncertain  and 
affected,  although  at  times  bold  and  clever,  his  melodramatic  and  bombastic 
composition,  his  sensual  kind  of  virtue  — in  a word,  all  his  qualities  and  all 
his  faults  are  whollv  his  own. — from  the  french 

SIDNEY  COLVIN  ‘PORTFOLIO’  tS7'2 

Generally,  in  discussing  the  f rench  painters  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
turv, we  find  that  they  are  a long  way  removed  from  our  taste.  In  the 
case  of  Watteau  the  brilliant,  of  the  admirable  Chardin  — to  some  extent 
even  of  Boucher,  the  careless  and  voluptuous  — what  we  have  to  do  is  a work 
of  vindication,  the  work,  most  welcome  to  the  true  critical  spirit,  of  reviving 
extinct  sources  of  pleasure  or  trving  to  create  new  ones,  of  defining  and  put- 
ting their  value  upon  things  delightful  in  their  degrees,  and  of  which  the  de- 
lightfulness had  in  part  escaped  us.  But  as  to  Greuze  the  case  is  different. 
With  the  other  masters  of  the  eighteenth  century  Greuze  had  in  his  own 
country  undergone  his  day  of  depreciation;  with  the  rest  of  them  he  was 
rescued  from  that  slight  esteem,  when  it  would  have  been  just,  or  little  less 
than  just,  that  he  should  have  remained  in  it.  Like  his  betters,  he  now  com- 
mands immense  favor  and  immense  prices.  A French  critic  has  remonstrated 
with  us  for  making  so  much  of  a painter  who,  “after  all,”  savs  he,  “is  of 
the  second  rank  ; whose  drawing  is  meanly  rounded  ; whose  modeling  is  hea\  y 
and  soft;  who  has  no  knowledge  of  chiaroscuro;  whose  simplicitv  is  part  af- 
fectation; the  movements  ofwho.se  figures  are  vulgar  or  pseudo-dramatic.” 
Beneath  whatever  may  be  trivial,  affected,  or  in  the  worst  case  vicious,  in 
the  art  of  Greuze’s  predecessors  and  contemporaries,  there  is  always  a real 
artistic  gift  — a first-rate  dexterity  of  observation  and  draftsmanship  in  one, 
a profuse  ingenuity  and  surprising  decorative  knack  in  another.  Beneath 
what  is  wrong  in  Greuze,  however,  there  is  little  but  pretense.  He  has  that 


( •) 


34 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


shallow  and  obvious  attractiveness,  both  in  the  look  and  meaning  of  his  work, 
which  appeals  at  once  to  coarse  observations.  It  is  this  surface  fascination 
which  makes  him  so  dangerous  to  such  as  are  young  in  these  things — to  the 
public;  it  is  for  this  he  might  be  banished  by  the  legislators  of  no  matter  how 
liberal  a republic  of  art.  Just  as  surely  as  Greuze  offends  the  skilled  percep- 
tions, so  surely  does  he  take  the  crowd;  until  it  makes  you  fume  to  hear  the 
exclamations  of  well-meaning  fellow-creatures  over  his  empty  beauty,  his 
ogling  innocence,  his  immoral  moralities,  his  styleless  grace,  his  sentimentality 
without  refinement,  his  artistic  sententiousness,  his  ill  composition  and  ill 
drawing,  and  the  affectations  in  which  he  is  steeped. 

One  of  Greuze’s  merits  is  that  he  was  original  in  his  vein,  such  as  it  is 
— the  vein  of  bourgeois  and  peasant  life,  treated  from  a dramatic  and  mor- 
alizing point  of  view.  Middle-class  and  humble  life,  so  treated,  starts  by  the 
middle  of  Greuze’s  century  into  the  first  place  in  the  literary  romance  of  the 
time.  It  preoccupies  and  gives  its  color  to,  more  than  any  other  one  element, 
the  literary  sentiment  in  France  of  the  days  preceding  the  Revolution.  But 
Greuze  was  its  first  exponent  in  art.  . . . 

He  has  four  main  kinds  of  sample  besides  portraits.  They  are,  first,  the 
class  of  compositions  of  several  figures  telling  a distinctly  dramatic  story, 
such  as  the  famous  ‘Village  Bride.’  Of  this  class  again  are  the  pendants  in 
the  Louvre  of  ‘The  Father’s  Curse’  and  ‘The  Punished  Son ’ — here,  the  old 
peasant  stretching  out  his  hands  to  curse  a graceless  son,  mother  and  elder 
children  variously  deprecating  or  distressed,  younger  ones  bellowing  with  dis- 
may; there,  the  same  old  man  dying,  the  runaway  coming  home  a cripple, 
just  in  time  to  see  his  father’s  death,  mother  and  children  again  reproaching 
or  lamenting.  Of  this  class,  too,  are  many  of  the  pieces  in  which  Diderot 
especially  delights,  and  which  tickle  perpetually  with  the  same  allusion.  It 
is  a girl  pouting  or  crying  over  something  lost  or  broken  — broken  eggs,  a 
broken  pitcher,  a broken  looking-glass,  a dead  bird,  a withered  bunch  of 
flowers,  and  so  on,  and  so  on.  Some  of  these  belong  to  the  class  of  large 
compositions  with  accessories  and  a story;  some  to  another  class  of  single 
figures  with  accessories  and  a story.  Then  there  is  another  variety  of  the 
large  compositions,  which  simply  represents  scenes  without  any  or  much  nar- 
rative interest.  And  there  is  the  fourth  and  best-known  class  of  single  sym- 
bolical heads:  innumerable  heads  and  shoulders  of  girls  with  faces  fourteen 
years  old  and  figures  eighteen,  smiling  or  ogling,  languishing  or  devout,  and 
set  to  typify  Innocence  or  Repentance;  to  stand  for  Psyche  or  Magdalene, 
or  whoever  it  may  be;  to  entice  with  pulpy  complexions  and  bare  throats, 
disordered  ringlets  and  fluttering  scarfs,  great  violet-colored  eyes  and  little 
coral  mouths,  and  all  the  recipe  fascinations  of  a shallow  prettiness.  Some- 
times there  are  formal  mythologies,  a Diana  and  Callisto,  a Nymph  sacri- 
ficing to  Venus;  once  there  is  a great  history-picture  of  Septimius  Severus 
rebuking  Caracalla;  but  these,  especially  the  last,  are  failures.  . . . 

In  the  history  of  the  world  as  well  as  in  the  history  of  art,  the  work  of 
Greuze  has  no  doubt  some  importance,  as  it  embodied  the  social  and  literary 
sentiment  which  we  have  seen — as  it  reflected,  and  in  its  way  glorified,  the 
classes  in  society  who  were  to  make  the  great  Revolution  and  to  change  the 
old  world  into  a new.  But  it  will  not  escape  the  student  who  can  see  when 

[76] 


GREUZE 


35 


expressional  or  dramatic  painting  is  dexterous  and  true,  and  when  historical 
or  ideal  painting  is  dignified  and  beautiful,  that  the  painting  of  Greuze  has 
neither  the  virtues  of  the  one  class  nor  of  the  other.  It  will  not  escape  him 
that  these  types  of  village  patriarch,  virtuous  poor  matron,  and  sturdy  peasant 
children,  are  shallow  and  false  types,  that  their  attitudes  are  forced  and  pre- 
tentious, that  in  their  gesticulation,  their  facial  contortions,  the  outspread 
hands  and  exaggerated  passion  of  the  actors,  there  is  a vain  display  of  science 
which  does  not  exist.  He  will  acknowledge,  both  in  these  and  in  the  single 
heads  which  the  majority  find  so  seductive,  a personal  and  not  unpleasant 
choice  of  color — a skilful  manner  with  the  brush.  Greuze,  he  will  say, 
worked  not  unpleasantly  in  a key  of  his  own,  of  light  violet,  quiet  blue,  gray, 
and  maroon  or  cocoa-color.  In  an  age  when  “touch”  was  everything,  he 
found  out  a touch  of  his  own,  more  like  that  of  Rubens  than  of  another;  he 
laid  on  his  thick  smooth  flesh-tints,  creamy  yellow  in  the  lights  and  cool 
violet  in  the  shadows,  with  something  of  the  same  rich  and  buttery  succulence 
with  which  Rubens  laid  on  his  very  different  scale  of  carnations.  He  painted 
with  a certain  prettiness  and  cleverness  the  jumble  of  a boudoir  or  cottage. 
And  it  is  to  the  credit  of  his  technical  processes  that  they  have  stood  the  test 
of  time  surprisingly.  But  he  was  one  of  the  few  p'renchmen  who  never  had 
any  instinct  of  composition;  who  told  his  story  clumsily  and  heavily,  and 
was  tedious  as  well  as  affected.  And  he  could  not  really  draw;  most  of  the 
heads  and  bosoms  which  a blunt  perception  hnds  so  fascinating  are  atrociouslv 
ill  drawn;  he  had  not  even  properly  mastered  the  charms  which  he  was  con- 
tinually repeating.  Grant  him  a few  portraits  in  which  he  catches  wdth  some 
elegance  and  dignity,  and  without  too  much  display,  the  elegance  and  dignity 
of  the  sitter.  Still,  to  see  through  Greuze  is  in  art  the  beginning  of  knowl- 
edge. 

CLAUDEPHILLIPS  ‘ARTJOURNAI,  ’1901 

Three  chief  phases  are  to  be  noted  in  the  talent  of  Greuze.  He  is  the 
sentimental  moralist,  starting  not  from  a study  of  humanitv  as  it  is,  but 
from  a preconceived  idea  of  his  own — or  rather,  perhaps,  of  the  men  of  let- 
ters of  his  time.  He  is  the  erotic  sentimentalist,  outwardlv  decent  in  his  ret- 
icence, yet  in  suggestion  infinitelv  more  insidious  than  a Boucher,  a Baudouin, 
or  a P'ragonard,  since  he  lacks  their  open-air  frankness,  their  humor.  P'inallv, 
he  is  the  portraitist,  modest,  charming,  and  distinguished  in  his  rendering  of 
women,  simple  and  even  severe  in  his  rendering  of  men. 

It  was  as  a sentimental  moralist  of  the  brush  that  his  great  fame  was  won 
at  a bound,  with  such  pictures  as  ‘A  P'ather  Reading  the  Bible  to  his  Chil- 
dren,’ ‘The  Village  Bride,’  ‘ I'he  P'ather’s  Curse,’  and  ‘ The  Punished  Son.’ 
But  this  is  not  the  stern,  wholesome  moralizing  of  a Plogarth,  who  lays  on 
the  lash  without  mercy,  pitying,  it  may  be,  yet  abating  nothing  of  his  cruel 
flagellation;  it  is  the  outcome  of  the  affected  sensibility,  the  scntimcntalitv 
worn  as  a becoming  garment,  which  is  so  peculiar  to  the  eighteenth  century. 
It  is  to  be  found  in  a loftier  phase  in  the  greatest  literature  of  the  moment, 
in  the  works  of  Diderot  himself,  and  preeminently  in  those  of  Jean- jaccjues 
Rousseau.  Here,  in  the  painted  work  of  Greuze,  we  have  the  sentimentality 


36 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


in  the  sniveling  stage.  It  protests  too  much,  and  there  is  in  it  too  little  of 
real  sympathy,  of  real  comprehension.  Greuze  is  playing  '''‘grand  premier 
prix  de  vertu”  for  the  gallery,  and  Diderot  too  hastily  accords  to  him  the 
laurels — almost  the  halo.  And  then  from  the  technical  standpoint  it  is  im- 
possible to  enjoy  these  once  famous  pieces,  so  cold  is  the  color,  so  black  are 
the  shadows,  so  defective  and  dramatically  inexpressive  is  the  general  ar- 
rangement, so  limited  the  power  to  realize  tragic  gesture,  or  the  soul  as  it 
burns  through  the  human  physiognomy  in  culminating  moments  of  emotion. 

Greuze’s  great  glory  with  the  connoisseur  and  amateur  of  yesterday  — 
and,  in  a less  degree,  cf  to-day  — is  his  vast  gallery  of  young  women  in  the 
bloom  of  womanhood,  but  more  especially  of  young  girls  and  children.  Even 
here  he  is  but  rarely  a true  colorist,  if  we  compare  him  to  a Watteau,  a 
Lancret,  a Pater,  a Boucher,  or  a Fragonard.  His  tints  are  at  the  best  cold 
and  porcelain-like  in  their  prettiness;  the  sense  of  atmosphere  is  absent.  But 
he  has,  it  must  be  confessed,  certain  very  striking  qualities  of  his  own;  and 
to  express  for  these  celebrated  studies  of  girlhood  and  womanhood,  bv  which 
he  even  to-day  maintains  his  place  as  a popular  painter,  too  exaggerated  a 
disdain  would  be  to  yield  to  an  instinct  rather  than  to  a conviction.  He  has 
an  admirable  way  of  stating  his  subject,  of  composing  his  single  figure  in 
such  fashion  that  it  stamps  itself  in  the  memory  of  the  beholder.  The  brush 
is  wielded  with  more  energy  and  decision — especially  in  the  broadly  disposed 
and  broadlv  painted  draperies  — than  the  casual  observer  at  first  imagines. 
There  is  undoubted  sprightliness,  undoubted  attractiveness  of  a kind  in  these 
things,  though  it  is  anything  but  the  fresh  unsullied  charm  that  the  admirers 

" les  nueurs  dans  V art'"  may  have  chosen  to  discover  in  them.  The  typ- 
ical instance,  though  not  by  any  means  the  best  picture,  is  ‘The  Broken 
Pitcher,’  of  the  Louvre;  and  with  it,  as  regards  the  mode  of  presentment 
and  the  quality  of  the  suggestiveness,  may  be  classed  many  others  in  which 
Greuze  gives  with  a rare  subtlety,  with  a suggestiveness  the  more  unpleasant 
because  it  is  so  decently  veiled,  the  unripeness  of  sweet  youth  that  has  not 
in  it  the  elements  of  resistance  to  temptation.  . . . 

In  the  category  of  portraits  are  some  exquisite  things  which  might  quite 
as  well  be  placed  in  the  class  which  we  have  just  been  discussing.  Among 
these  should  be  cited  the  discreetly  fascinating  ‘Madame  de  Porcin’  in  the 
too  little  visited  museum  of  Angers,  and  the  voluptuous  ‘Mile.  Sophie 
Arnould,’  in  the  Wallace  Collection.  Among  the  portraits  of  men,  none  is 
more  typical  of  the  austere  side  which  so  seldom  peeps  out  in  the  art  of 
Greuze  than  the  portrait  of  the  master  himself  in  the  Louvre.  He  appears 
here  grave,  almost  grim,  in  all  the  bitter  disenchantment  that  came  into  his 
life  of  brilliant  popular  success  when  the  French  Academy,  estimating  at  its 
true  value  his  historical  picture,  ‘The  Emperor  Severus  Rebuking  Caracalla,’ 
consented  to  accept  him,  but  only  as  a “painter  of  genre.”  . , . 

Let  us  strive  to  be  just  to  the  once  so  over-rated  and  now  so  often  under- 
rated painter,  from  whom  the  truest  lovers  of  art  of  to-day  recoil  with  a curi- 
ous kind  of  aversion,  yet  whom  in  fairness  they  cannot  wholly  deny,  and 
some  of  whose  pictures  are  veritable  inventions — something  added  to  art. 

[78] 


GREUZE 


37 


Cf)t  5^orfes  of  (gmijt 

DESCRIPTIONS  OF  THE  PLATES 


‘THELISTENINGGIRL’  PLATEI 

“AMONG  all  the  pretty  heads  painted  by  this  Carlo  Dolci  of  Prance,” 
xjL  writes  Mr.  M.  H.  Spielmann,  “ ‘The  Listening  Girl’  holds  a leading 
place.  It  is  well  painted  and  the  expression  is  fresh  as  well  as  charming.” 
This  picture,  for  which  the  late  Marquis  of  Hertford  paid  a sum  equiva- 
lent to  $6,300,  is  one  of  the  most  popular  of  the  twenty-one  examples  of 
Greuze’s  work  in  the  Wallace  Collection  at  Hertford  House,  London. 

‘IHEBROKENPITCHER’  PLATEII 

NO  picture  by  Greuze  is  so  celebrated,  nor  has  any  been  so  often  copied, 
as  ‘ The  Broken  Pitcher  ’ (‘  La  Cruche  Cassee  ’),  now  in  the  Louvre,  Paris. 
She  is  familiar  to  us  all,  this  young  girl  dressed  in  w'hite,  with  a gauze  scarf 
loosely  tied  about  her  neck,  a violet  ribbon  and  a flower  in  her  chestnut- 
brown  hair,  and  with  an  expression  so  naive  and  charming  as  she  holds  her 
lapful  of  flowers  and  carries  over  one  arm  the  pitcher  that  she  has  just  broken 
that  she  has  captivated  the  public  taste  from  the  time  that  she  was  first  painted 
down  to  the  present  day. 

Madame  Roland,  in  a letter  written  before  her  marriage,  speaks  of  visiting 
Greuze  in  his  studio  and  of  seeing  ‘The  Broken  Pitcher’  there.  “ It  represents 
a little  girl,”  she  writes,  “innocent,  fresh,  and  fair,  who  has  broken  her  pitcher. 
She  stands  near  the  fountain  where  the  accident  has  just  taken  place.  Her 
eyes  are  not  opened  too  wide,  and  her  lips  are  still  parted  as  she  wonders  how 
the  misfortune  happened  and  whether  she  is  to  blame.  Nothing  could  be 
prettier  nor  more  piquant,  and  the  only  fault  to  be  found  with  Alonsicur 
Greuze  is  that  he  has  not  made  the  little  girl  quite  sorry  enough  to  prevent 
her  going  to  the  fountain  again!  I told  him  this,  and  he  was  amused.” 

‘The  Broken  Pitcher’  is  a thoroughly  characteristic  example  of  Greuze’s 
favorite  theme  of  Innocence  in  Distress,  and  if  in  this  picture  Innocence  is  a 
trifle  theatrical  in  her  pose,  if  she  is,  as  M.  Charles  Normand  has  said,  “a 
flower  that  has  sprung  up  between  the  pavements  of  Paris,”  she  has  never- 
theless retained  sufficient  freshness  and  charm  to  constitute  one  of  Greuze’s 
most  fascinating  creations. 

< T H E M I L K M A I I)  ’ I*  I,  A E E 1 1 1 

‘ ' I '' H Pv  Milkmaid’  (‘La  Laitiere’),  one  of  Greuze’s  most  graceful  and 
J.  beautiful  works,  was  sold  soon  after  the  painter’s  death  for  7,210  francs 
($  1 ,442),  but  when  bc(]ucathed  to  the  French  nation  by  Baroness  Nathaniel 
de  Rothschild  in  1899,  its  value  was  estimated  at  600,000  francs,  or  $120,- 
000.  It  is  now  in  the  Louvre,  Paris,  where  it  hangs  as  a pendant  to  ‘ I'he 
Broken  Pitcher’  (plate  n). 

I 7 it] 


38 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


Greuze  has  here  represented  a milkmaid  holding  a measure  in  one  of  her 
pretty  hands  while  she  rests  the  other  upon  the  neck  of  a brown  horse 
laden  with  baskets.  She  wears  a white  dress  and  white  linen  cap.  Touches 
of  scarlet  and  amber  produce  a frank  harmony  of  color.  An  idealized  milk- 
maid, certainly,  is  this  young  girl  of  the  type  so  often  portrayed  by  Greuze 
— not  one,  as  M.  Charles  Normand  has  said,  whom  we  should  expect  to 
find  in  the  barn-yard  milking  the  cows,  but  for  whose  delicate  beauty  the 
operatic  stage  would  be  a more  suitable  setting,  or  the  picturesque  palace  of 
the  Little  Trianon  at  Versailles,  where  so  dainty  and  aristocratic  a milkmaid 
might  well  have  played  at  dairy  work  with  Marie  Antoinette. 

‘THE  K.ISS’  ELATE  IV 

This  picture  in  Mr.  Alfred  de  Rothschild’s  London  Collection  is  so  ex- 
quisitely graceful  and  tender  that  even  those  to  whom  Greuze’s  art  does 
not  appeal  can  hardly  resist  it.  It  offers  “a  supreme  example  of  the  art 
of  that  period  of  unreflective  enjoyment  and  facile  prettiness  which  this  painter 
represented.” 

Technically,  the  painting  is  somewhat  thin  in  quality  and  the  composi- 
tion mannered,  but  these  faults  are  counterbalanced  by  the  grace  of  the  figure 
of  the  young  girl  who  stands  at  a window  draped  with  a green  curtain  to  throw 
a kiss  to  her  lover. 

‘PORTRAITOFTHECOUNTESSMOLLIEN’  PLATEV 

There  is  a story  that  when  Greuze,  having  painted  the  portrait  of 
the  Dauphin  of  France  to  that  prince’s  satisfaction,  was  asked  by  him 
to  paint  one  of  the  Dauphiness  also,  the  artist,  seeing  the  enormous  quantity 
of  rouge  with  which  the  lady’s  face  was  covered,  hastily  begged  to  be  excused, 
adding  with  more  sincerity  than  politeness,  “ I can’t  paint  such  heads  as  that ! ” 
If,  however,  Greuze  was  hampered  by  the  artifices  of  rouge  and  powder,  he 
was  at  his  best  when  he  undertook  to  transfer  to  his  canvas  the  fresh  and 
delicate  colors  of  youth,  as  in  this  portrait  of  the  little  Countess  Mollien,  in 
which  his  brush  has  so  well  rendered  the  soft  flesh,  the  curves  of  the  rounded 
cheeks  and  exquisitely  modeled  little  chin,  and  the  unconscious  expression 
in  the  eyes  of  the  child,  whose  fair  skin  seems  yet  fairer  by  contrast  with  the 
black  coats  of  the  puppies  that  she  holds  in  her  lap. 

‘INNOCENCE’  PLATE  VI 

This  characteristic  example  of  the  art  of  Greuze  is  one  of  the  most  cele- 
brated of  his  works  in  the  Wallace  Collection  at  Hertford  House,  Lon- 
don. The  motive  of  the  picture  was  a favorite  one  with  the  artist,  the  key- 
note of  whose  work  was  sentiment,  and  who  was  fond  of  placing  lambs  and 
doves,  emblems  of  innocence,  in  the  arms  of  his  pretty  little  girls;  and 
although  many  of  his  faults  are  apparent  in  the  picture — although  the  lamb 
is  unreal  and  the  little  girl,  like  so  many  of  her  sisters,  has  the  head  of  a child 
upon  the  shoulders  of  a woman,  and  is  somewhat  aftected  in  her  pose — there 
is,  nevertheless,  so  much  charm  about  the  conception  and  beauty  in  its  pre- 


0 


GREUZE 


39 


sentment  that  it  is  easv  to  understand  the  popular  ta\  or  that  has  always  been 
accorded  to  it. 

‘THELETTER’  I’LATEVII 

This  picture  in  Mr.  Alfred  de  Rothschild’s  Collection,  London,  is  one 
of  Greuze’s  most  charming  representations  of  those  young  girls  whom 
he  painted  so  frequently  that,  as  Charles  Blanc  has  said,  “a  whole  convent 
might  be  peopled  with  them.”  The  painting  in  this  celebrated  portrayal  of 
his  favorite  subject  is  unusuallv  delicate,  the  flesh-tones  tender,  the  white 
drapery  less  like  marble  or  plaster  than  is  often  the  case  in  the  artist’s  work, 
and  both  the  pose  and  the  expression  of  the  face  of  the  young  girl,  in  whose 
hand  is  the  letter  that  gives  the  picture  its  title,  are  free  from  the  aft'ectation 
that  so  frequently  mars  his  compositions. 

‘THE  VILLAGE  BRIDE’  ^ PLATE  VIII 

The  Village  Bride’  (‘L’Accordee  de  \’illage’)  was  exhibited  at  the  Salon 
of  1761.  It  met  with  an  immediate  success  and  aroused  the  most  en- 
thusiastic praise  from  one  and  all.  “At  last  I have  seen  this  picture  by  our 
friend  Greuze,”  wrote  Diderot,  “but  it  was  not  without  some  difliculty,  for 
it  continues  to  attract  the  crowd.  ...  It  is  certainly  the  best  thing  that  he 
has  painted,  and  does  him  honor  both  as  a painter  skilled  in  his  art  and  as  a 
man  of  taste  and  genius.  . . . The  composition  seems  to  me  to  be  very 
good;  the  subject  is  full  of  pathos  and  appeals  to  the  tenderest  emotions.” 
The  De  Goncourts,  writing  a century  and  more  later,  when  a truer  esti- 
mate had  been  made  of  Greuze’s  artistic  achievement,  remark  that  the  public 
“shut  their  eyes  to  the  inharmonious  colors,  the  discord  of  tones,  the  glit- 
tering of  the  lights,  and  all  the  faults  of  the  picture,  and  were  charmed,  fas- 
cinated, captivated  by  the  idea — in  a word,  bv  the  sentiment  which  breathed 
from  every  portion  of  the  canvas.” 

The  scene  of  this  celebrated  picture  is  the  interior  of  a cottage.  A wed- 
ding has  just  taken  place,  and  the  notary,  in  a black  coat  and  colored  breeches, 
is  seated  at  a table  to  the  right  holding  the  marriage  contract  in  his  hand. 
In  the  center  the  pretty  young  bride,  dressed  in  white  and  with  a rose  in  her 
bosom,  bends  gently  towards  her  mother  and  sister,  linking  her  arm  the  while 
within  that  of  her  husband.  The  father  of  the  bride  has  given  his  son-in-law 
a bag  containing  his  daughter’s  marriage  portion,  and  with  arms  outstretched 
seems  to  address  the  young  couple  in  heartfelt  words.  Another  sister  of  the 
bride  leans  upon  her  father’s  chair,  and  several  younger  children,  one  of 
whom  is  engaged  in  feeding  some  chickens  in  the  foreground,  serve  to  en- 
liven the  scene.  The  picture  is  now  in  the  Louvre,  Paris. 

‘ T H E P U N I S H E D S O N ’ P I.  A r E I X 

Studies  for  “I  hc  Punished  Son’  (‘J>e  Eils  Puni’)  and  its  companion 
picture,  ‘The  Father’s  Curse’  (‘La  Malediction  Paternelle ’),  of  which  it 
is  the  sequel,  were  exhibited  at  the  Salon  of  1765  and  produced  a profound 
impression.  Diderot,  enraptured,  praised  them  in  extravagant  terms.  “7'his 

(81  I 


40 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


is  your  painter  and  mine,”  he  wrote,  “the  first  who  has  attempted  to  intro- 
duce morality  into  art.”  -His  opinion  reflected  and  expressed  the  general  feel- 
ing of  all  who  saw  these  two  domestic  dramas  which  attained  so  great  a celeb- 
rity and  added  so  much  to  the  reputation  of  the  painter,  but  which  to  our 
changed  views  and  tastes  seem  theatrical,  over-strained,  and  sensational. 

Both  the  pictures  painted  from  these  studies  are  now  in  the  Louvre,  Paris. 
I'he  first,  ‘The  F'ather’s  Curse,’  represents  a father  pronouncing  a maledic- 
tion upon  his  degenerate  son  in  the  presence  of  various  members  of  the  family, 
who,  horror-stricken,  are  grouped  about  him  in  melodramatic  attitudes.  In 
the  second  picture,  the  one  reproduced  in  plate  ix,  the  son,  who  we  are  led 
to  suppose  from  his  wounded  condition  has  been  to  the  war,  has  returned 
to  the  paternal  roof  only  to  find  his  father  lying  dead,  and  his  mother,  sisters, 
and  brothers  distracted  with  grief.  Overwhelmed  with  remorse,  he  bows  his 
head  in  tears,  realizing  that  his  repentance  has  come  too  late. 

Apart  from  the  exaggerated  sentiment  of  this  picture,  it  is  technically  in- 
ferior to  many  of  the  painter’s  less  ambitious  and  less  famous  works.  The 
colors  are  dull  and  opaque  and  are  rendered  more  so  by  the  greenish-black, 
heavy  background;  the  draperies,  noticeably  the  coverlet  of  the  bed,  are  solid 
and  metallic  in  their  folds,  and  the  pose  of  many  of  the  figures  is  strained 
and  aftected.  But  even  when  these  and  other  faults  are  taken  into  consider- 
ation there  is  something  striking  in  the  composition  — in  the  attitude  and 
gesture  of  the  mother  as  she  shows  her  repentant  son  the  dead  body  of  his 
father,  and  in  the  calm  face  of  the  dead,  contrasted  with  the  agitated  move- 
ment of  the  figures  about  the  bedside.  No  wonder  that  in  painting  such  scenes 
of  domestic  life,  Greuze  should  have  found  favor  with  a public  weary  of  the 
cold  and  ceremonious  pictures  of  the  court  painters,  and  satiated  as  well  with 
the  countless  heathen  deities  which  adorned  the  canvases  of  Boucher  and  his 
followers;  and  that  this  painter  of  the  life  of  the  people,  however  artificial 
his  portrayal  of  that  life  may  now  seem  to  be,  should  mark  an  epoch  in  the 
history  of  h'rench  art  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

‘PORTRAITOFMLLE.SOPHIEARNOULD’  PLATEX 

ALTHOUGH  Greuze  established  his  reputation  and  won  his  immense 
popularity  by  his  portrayal  of  moral  and  sentimental  scenes,  and  has 
retained  it  by  his  pictures  of  pretty  young  girls,  it  is  nevertheless  in  portrai- 
ture that  he  is  often  at  his  best.  There  no  insincerity  nor  aftectation  mars  his 
work;  indeed  we  are  told  that  so  faithfully  did  his  brush  transcribe  the  fea- 
tures and  characteristics  of  a face  that  his  portraits  often  failed  to  please  his 
sitters.  One  of  the  most  charming  that  he  ever  painted  is  the  one  in  the 
Wallace  Collection,  London,  reproduced  in  plate  x,  representing  Mile.  Sophie 
Arnould,  the  celebrated  P'rench  actress  and  singer,  in  which  there  is  just  a 
touch  of  the  poseuse — “the  affectation  of  the  pretty  woman  who,  with  all 
her  consummate  wit  and  self-command,  could  not  quite  lose  her  self-con- 
sciousness when  standing  before  the  easel  of  the  painter.” 

It  has  been  stated  that  Sophie  Arnould  was  not  really  beautiful — that  her 
mouth  was  too  large  and  her  skin  too  dark;  but  all  admit  that  her  figure  was 

[82] 


GREUZE 


41 


perfect,  her  presence  graceful,  and  her  fascination  irresistible.  In  his  portrait 
of  this  famous  queen  of  the  stage  Greuze  shows  her  to  us  with  her  broad 
hat  tilted  to  one  side,  her  air  of  easy  confidence,  and  her  attitude  graceful, 
careless,  and  yet  half-studied — all  characteristic  of  the  gifted  actress  and 
opera-singer  who  by  her  genius  and  her  keen  and  subtle  wit  dazzled  and 
dominated  the  brilliant  world  of  P rance  in  the  eighteenth  century. 

A LIST  OF  THE  TRINCIPAL  PAINTINGS  BY  GREUZE 
IN  PUBLIC  COLLECTIONS 

OF  the  vast  number  of  pictures  painted  by  Greuze,  many  are  in  private  collections, 
among  the  most  notable  of  which  are,  in  England,  the  Royal  Collection  at  Bucking- 
ham Palace,  London,  the  Duke  of  Wellington’s  Collection  at  Apsley  House,  London, 
those  of  the  Earl  of  Dudley,  the  Marquis  of  Lansdowne,  Lord  Rosebery,  Lord  Normanton, 
Lord  Yarborough,  Mr.  Allred  de  Rothschild,  who  owns  ‘The  Kiss’  and  ‘The  Letter’ 
(plates  IV  and  vii).  Captain  G.  L.  Holtord,  Mr.  H.  L.  Bischoftsheim,  Mr.  J.  Pierpont 
Morgan,  Mr.  Beit,  and  Mr.  Reginald  Vaile;  in  Paris,  the  collections  of  the  Due  de  la 
Tremoille,  of  Count  Greffiihle,  the  Collection  of  Baron  de  Schlichting,  of  the  Marquis  de 
Laborde,  the  Marquis  de  Pange,  the  Countess  de  Goyon,  M.  Pradelle,  M.  Edouard  Andre, 
M.  Leon  Say,  and  different  members  of  the  Rothschild  family;  in  Germany,  the  Collection 
of  Count  Axel  Wachtmeister  at  Wanas;  in  St.  Petersburg,  that  of  Prince  Youssoupoff, 
who  owns  at  least  a dozen  pictures  by  Greuze;  and  examples  are  to  be  found  in  private  pos- 
session in  Baltimore,  Boston,  Chicago,  New  York,  Philadelphia,  and  other  cities  of  the 
United  States.  The  following  list  includes  the  chief  works  by  Greuze  contained  in  collec- 
tions that  are  accessible  to  the  public. 

AUSTRIA-HUNGARY.  Budapest  Gallery;  Head  ofa  Girl  — Vienna,  Imperial 
Gallery:  Three  Heads  of  Young  Girls;  Head  of  a Young  Man  — Vienna,  Czermn 
Gallery:  A Magdalene  — ENGLAND.  Cambridge,  Fitzwilliam  Museum;  Beggar- 
boy;  Beggar-girl  — London,  National  Gallery:  Girl  with  an  Apple;  Girl  witli  a Lamb; 
Two  Heads  ol  Girls  — London,  Wallace  Colleci  ion;  Innocence  (Plate  vi);  Sorrow; 
Roguishness;  Fidelity;  The  Listening  Girl  (Plate l);  A Bacchante;  Girl  with  a Scarf;  Boy 
with  a Dog;  Portrait  of  Mile.  Sophie  Arnould  (Plate  x);  Ariadne;  Girl  in  a Blue  Dress;  Girl 
in  a White  Dress;  Portrait  of  a Lady;  Girl  witli  Doves;  Stiuly  of  Grief;  The  Offering  to 
Cupid;  The  Broken  Mirror;  Girl  Leaning  on  her  Hand;  Cupid  with  a Torch;  Filial  Piety; 
The  Letter-writer — FRANCE.  Aix  Museum:  Triumph  ot  Galatea;  Studyol  a Child  — 
Angers  Museum:  Portrait  of  Madame  de  Porcin  — Besan(;’ON  Museu.m:  Paul  Strogonoff 
as  a Child;  Head  of  a Girl  — Chantilly,  Conde  Museum;  ‘Teiulre  Desir’;  Tlie  Sur- 
prise; Two  Heads  of  Girls — Cherbourg  Museum:  Portrait  of  Baron  Denon  — Dijon 
Museum:  Study  of  a Head  — Lille  Museum:  Psyche  Crowning  Cupid — -Lyons  Mu- 
seum: Portrait  of  Greuze;  The  Kind  Mother;  Tlie  Artist’s  llaugliter  — Marseilles 
Museum:  Portrait  of  a Man — Montpellier  Museum:  Morning  Prayer;  ‘ Le  Gateau 
des  Rois’;  The  Little  Mathematician;  Girl  with  a Basket;  Girl  with  Eolded  Hanils;  Study 
of  Old  Man’s  Head;  Portrait  of  a Young  Girl;  Study  of  a Child;  Head  ot  a Girl  — 
Nantes  Museum:  Portraits  of  M.  de  Saint-Morys  and  Ids  Son  — NiMES  Museum:  Study 
of  Old  Woman’s  Head  — Paris,  Louvre:  Tlie  Em|)emr  Severus  Rebuking  Caracalla; 
The  Village  Bride  (Plate  viii);  The  Father’s  Curse;  The  Punislied  Son  (Plate  ix);  The 
Broken  Pitcher  (Plate  ii);  The  Milk-maid  (Plate  iii);  Portrait  of  I’.tienne  Jeaurat;  Por- 
trait of  a Man;  Portrait  of  Duval;  Head  ofa  Girl;  Danae;  Portrait  of  Gensonne;  I’ortrait 
of  Fabre  d’Eglantine;  Portrait  of  Greuze  (Page  64);  I’ortrait  of  Greuze  (sketch);  Head  ot  a 
Boy;  Two  Studies  of  Young  Girls  — Troyes  Museum:  Portrait  of  Haculard  tl’Arnaud  — 
Versailles,  Palace:  Portrait  of  Bernard  le  Bovier  tie  Fontenelle  — GERMANY.  Ber- 
lin Gallery:  Head  of  a Girl  — Go  tha  Gallery:  The  Emperor  Caracalla — Leipsic 
Museu.m:  Study  of  a Woman — Metz  Museum:  Danae;  Head  of  Bacchus;  Heatlofa 
Boy;  Portrait  of  Count  d’ Angevilliers  — Munich  Gallery:  Heatl  ot  a Young  Girl  — 

[s:>.] 


42 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


HOLLAND.  Rotterdam,  Boymans’  Museum:  The  Happy  Mother  — ITALY. 
Rome,  Academy  of  St.  Luke:  Contemplation  — RUSSIA.  St.  Petersburg,  Hermi- 
tage Gallery:  Death  of  a Paralytic;  Head  of  a Girl;  Head  of  a Young  Man;  Head  of 
a Boy  — SCOTLAND.  Edinburgh,  National  Gallery  of  Scotland:  Girl  with 
Dead  Canary;  Girl  with  Broken  Pitcher  (study  for  ‘The  Broken  Pitcher’  in  the  Louvre); 
Girl  with  Folded  Hands;  Boy  with  Lesson-book;  Cottage  Interior  — Glasgow,  Corpo- 
ration Galleries:  The  Sulky  Boy;  Head  of  a Child  — UNITED  STATES.  Boston, 
Art  Museum:  ‘Le  Chapeau  blanc’  (loaned) — New  York,  Gallery  of  Art  of  the 
New  York  Historical  Society:  A Nymph  of  Diana;  Replica  of  ‘L’Avengle  trompe’; 
Portrait  of  the  Duke  de  Choiseul;  Head  of  a Young  Girl;  Virginie  (a  study);  Sketch  of  a 
Female  Head. 


(greujt  BStljUograpfip 

A LIST  OF  THE  PRINCIPAL  BOOKS  DEALING  WITH  GREUZE 

The  most  complete  studies  of  the  life  and  works  of  Greuze  are  the  biography  of  the 
artist  contained  in  ‘L’Art  du  XVIIInie  siecle’  by  Edmond  and  Jules  de  Goncourt 
(Paris,  1881-82),  and  M.  Charles  Normand’s  monograph  ‘Greuze’  (Paris,  1885).  The 
‘Notice  sur  Greuze’  by  Madame  C.  de  Valori,  published  in  the  Revue  Universelle  des 
Arts,  i860;  and  a special  number  oi  L' Artiste,  1868,  form  valuable  additions. 

Alexandre,  a.  Histoire  populaire  de  la  peinture:  ecole  fran9aise.  Paris  [1893]  — 
. Archives  de  Part  fran^ais.  Paris,  i 85  1-60 — Armitage,  H.  Greuze.  London,  1902 
— Becker,  A.W.,  and  Gorling,  A.  Kunstund  Kiinstler  des  achtzehnten  Jahrhunderts. 
Leipsic,  1865 — Blanc,  C.  Histoire  des  peintres  de  toutes  les  ecoles:  ecole  frangaise. 
Paris,  1865 — Brownell, W.  C.  French  Art.  NewYork,i9oi — Burger, W.  Tresors 
d’art  en  Angleterre.  Paris,  1882  — Diderot,  D.  Salons  (in  CEuvres  completes).  Paris, 
1821 — Dilke,  E.  F.  S.  French  Painters  of  the  XVIIP^  Century.  London,  1899  — 
Dohme,  R.  Jean  Greuze  (in  Dohme’s  Kunst  tind  Kiinstler,  etc.).  Leipsic,  1880  — 
Gautier,  T.  Guide  de  I’amateur  au  Musee  du  Louvre.  Paris,  1882  — Goncourt,  E. 
and  J.  de.  L’Art  du  XVIIIroe siecle.  Paris,  1881-82  — Gonse,  L.  Les  chefs-d’ceuvre 
des  Musees  de  France.  Paris,  1900  — Head,  Sir  E.  A hand-book  of  the  History  of  the 
Spanish  and  French  Schools  of  Painting.  London,  1848  — Houssaye,  A.  Gallerie  du 
XVIII"'^  siecle.  Paris,  1858 — Lalaing,  E.  de.  Watteau  et  Greuze.  Lille,  1888  — 
Lecarpentier,  C.  J.  F.  Notice  sur  Greuze.  Rouen,  1805 — Lejeune,  T.  Guide  the- 
orique  et  pratique  de  I’amateur  de  tableaux.  Paris,  1864 — Mariette,  P.  J.  Abecedario. 
Paris,  1853-54  — Martha,  C.  La  Delicatesse  dans  Part.  Paris,  1884 — Merson,  O. 
La  Peinture  fran^aise  au  XVII"''=  siecle  et  au  XVIIIn'*^'  Paris  [1900]  — Muther,  R. 
History  of  Modern  Painting.  New  York,  1896  — Normand,  C.  J.  B.  Greuze.  Paris 
[1885]  — PiLLET,  F.  (in  Michaud’s  Biographic  universelle).  Paris,  i843-[i865]  — 
Renouvier,  j.  Histoire  de  Part  pendant  la  Revolution.  Paris,  1873 — Smith,  J.  Cat- 
alogue Raisonne.  London,  1837  — Spielmann,  M.  H.  The  Wallace  Collection  in 
Hertford  House.  London,  1900  — StraNahan,  C.  H.  A History  of  French  Painting. 
New  York,  1895  — Temple,  A.  G.  The  Wallace  Collection.  Paris,  1902  — Viardot,  L. 
Les  Musees  de  France,  i860 — Wille,  J.  G.  Memoires  et  journal.  Paris,  1857  — 
Wyzewa,  T.  de,  and  Perreau,  X.  Les  Grands  peintres  de  la  France.  Paris,  1890. 

[84] 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


j 

CralJEltr’s 
art  Club 

\ PRACTICAL  and 
J~\_  successful  method 
lor  the  Study  of  Art  at  your  home,  or  in 
clubs,  devised  and  arranged  by  Mrs.  Adeliza 
Brainerd  Chaffee,  after  years  of  experience 
in  Lecturing,  Study,  and  Foreign  Travel. 

^^optes 

Fu//  details  upon  application 

COLORGRAPHS 

new  pictures,  the  “ Colorgraphs,”  are, 
as  the  title  suggests,  reproductions  in  color. 

subjects  have  been  carefully  selected 
from  the  most  famous  works  of  both  ancient 
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Hi0t  of  .i^ubicct#  J^oto  deabiB 
♦MADONNA  DEL  GRAN  DUCA  By  Raphael 

♦MADONNA  OF  THE  CHAIR  By  Raphael 

♦CORONATION  OF  THE  VIRGIN  By  Botticelli 

♦ ST.  ANTHONY  OF  PADUA  By  Murillo 

ST.  CECILIA  By  Raphael 

♦MARY’S  VISIT  TO  ELIZABETH  By  Albertinelli 

HOLY  FAMILY  By  Andrea  del  Sarto 

MADONNA  AND  CHILD  By  Murillo 

♦ CHRIST  THE  CONSOLER  By  Plockhorst 

♦THE  GOOD  SHEPHERD  By  Plockhorst 

« REPOSE  IN  EGYPT  By  Plockhorst 

♦HEAD  OF  CHRIST.  From  “Christ 

and  the  Rich  Young  Ruler  ’ ’ By  Hofmann 

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In  aiiswiTiiijf  :ulviTli>fnifMts,  jilcasc  mention  Masiiks  in  Ak  i' 


MASTERS  IN  ART 


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A partial  list  of  the  artists  to  be  considered  in  '•  Masters  in  Art’ 
during  the  tbrihcoming.,  19041  Volume  will  be  found  on  another 
page  of  this  issue.  The  numbers  which  have  already  appeared 
in  1904  are  : 

Part  49,  JANUARY  . . FRA  BARTOLOMMEO 

PART  51,  THE  ISSUE  FOR 

iWarcl) 


WILL  'LREAT  OF 


Bilrer’s  Cngralitngs 


NUMBERS  ISSUED  IN  PREVIOUS  VOLUMES 
OF  ‘MASTERS  IN  ART  ’ 


VOL.  1.  VOL.  2. 


Part  i.— VaN  DYCK 
pAur  z. — 1 niAN 


Par  r 
Par  r 
Part 
Part 
Par  r 
Par  1 
Par  r 


B.  — VELASQUEZ 

4. — HOLBEIN 

5.  — BOT  riCELLI 

6. — REMBRANDT 

7. — REYNOLDS 

8.  — MILLET 

— GIO.  BELLINI 


PakI'  10. — MURILLO 


Part  1 1 . — HALS 


Pare  12. — RAPHAEL 


^ Sculpture 


Part  ij.— RUBENS 
Part  14.— DA  VINCI 
Part  15.— DURER 
Part  16.— MICHELANGELO* 
Part  17.— MlCHELANGELOf 
Part  iS.— COROT 
Part  19.— BURNE-JONES 
Part  zo.— TER  BORCH 
Part  zi.— DELLA  ROBBIA 
Part  zz.— DEL  SARTO 
Part  zj.— GAINSBOROUGH 
Part  Z4.— CO R R EGGIO 
t Painting 


VOL.  3. 


Pak  r 25.— PHIDIAS  Part  31.— PAUL  POT'I'ER 

Part  26.-PERUGINO  Part  32.— GIOTTO 

Part  27.  — HOLBEIN  \ Part  33.— PRAXITELES 

Part  z8.— TINTORETTO  Part  34.— HOGARTH 

Part  29.— PIETER  de  HOOCH  Part  35.— TURNER 

Part  30. — NATTIER  Part  36. — LUINI 

^ Drawings 

VOL.  4. 


Part  37,  JANUARY 
Part  38,  FEBRUARY  . 
Part  39,  MARCH 
Pare  40,  APRIL 
Part  41.,  MAY 
Part  42,  JUNE 
Part  43,  JULY 
Part  44,  AUGUST 
Part  45,  SEPTEMBER  . 
Part  46,  OCTOBER 
Part  47,  NOVEMBER  . 
Part  48,  DECEMBER  . 


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Susan  F.  Bissell  F.  Luis  Mora 

Clifford  Carlton  Kenneth  Hayes  Miller 

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Howard  Chandler  Christy  Theodora  W.  Thayer 
Drawing,  Painting,  Composition.  ITustration,  Decorative 
and  Applied  Art.  Special  Classes  for  Advanced  Work  in  Por- 
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some,  Europe  is  a gay  casino ; to  others,  a circus  of  one  fast- 
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E.  W.  EMERSON 
A.  K.  CROSS 


Drawing  and 
Painting. 


Modeling 
Anatomy 
Perspective 
DEPT.  OF  DESIGN 
C.  HOWARD  WALKER 
DIRECTOR 


SCHOLARSHIPS 
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Henrietta  Wilson  v 
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36th  year:  Sept.  28th,  1903,  to  May  28th,  1904. 

J.  H.  GEST,  Director,  Cincinnati,  Ohio, 


For  Drawing.,  /^uinting^  Comfosition^ 
Artistic  Anatomy^  etc. 

For  Modeling 
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Hralutng 

CHARLES  D.  MAGINNIS 

NLY  practice  will  make  an  accomplished  pen-draughtsman  ; but  this  little 
treatise  teaches  whatever  can  be  taught  of  the  art;  namely,  how  to  practise, 
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experience  has  proved  useful.  The  key-note  of  the  book  is  practicality.  Each  of 
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make  most  valuable  use  of  his  spare  minutes. 

Price,  $1.00,  Postpaid 

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JANUARY  NUMBER  continued  the  Essays  on  WHISTLER’S  Art  and 
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tions. 

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M ASTE  RS  IN  ART 


t ■ — 

prospectus  ‘JEasters  tn  Art’  for  1904 


HE  Est  of  painters  to  be  presented  in  ‘ Masters 
IN  Art’  during  1904  — the  fifth  year  of  the 
Series — makes  it  already  certain  that  in  variety, 
in  interest,  and  in  the  charm  of  its  pictures  the 
forthcoming  volume  of  the  magazine  will  not  be  surpassed 
by  any  of  its  predecessors. 

c.  The  artists  chosen  for  subjects  will  range  in  date  from 
the  quaint,  primitive  painters  of  the  fifteenth  century  to 
those  of  our  own  time,  and  will  represent  the  art  of  the 
Italian,  German,  Flemish,  Dutch,  French,  and  English 
schools,  while  an  American  painter  will  be  treated  in  the 
magazine  for  the  first  time. 

^ In  general  plan  ‘Masters  in  Art’  will  remain  un- 
changed, continuing  to  present  in  its  text  all  the  features  of 
previous  years;  while,  as  heretofore,  advantage  will  be  taken 
of  every  improvement  in  photography,  engraving,  and  print- 
ing that  may  make  its  illustrations  more  faithful  and  beauti- 
ful reproductions. 

▼ 

MONO  ARTISTS  TO  BE 
TREATED  DURING  THE 
YEAR  MAY  BE  NAMED 

C.i^ra  •iSartolominco.  The  friar  painter  of  Madonnas 
and  Holy  Families,  who  with  his  own  intuitive  sense  of 
symmetry,  science  of  composition,  and  tender  feeling,  com- 
bined something  of  Raphael’s  grace. 


C,2I)um’6  ©nsraPmsfi.  The  first  number  of  the 
Series  to  be  devoted  wholly  to  engravings  will  have  for  its 
subject  the  unmatched  copperplates  and  woodcuts  of  Albrecht 
Diirer,  the  greatest  master  of  engraving  the  world  has  seen. 

C,Caplep.  'I'he  famous  American  painter  of  portraits  in 
Colonial  days. 

C,©eronc6e,  whose  art  was  the  most  gorgeous  of  all  the 
Venetian  school,  and  who  elevated  pageantry  to  the  height 
of  most  serious  art. 

C,t-anUEiccr.  The  English  painter  of  dogs  and  other 
animals,  who  expressed  the  emotional  natures  of  the  beasts 
he  portrayed. 

C.  iRfiseontcr,  whom  French  grace  grafted  upon  Dutch 
fidelity  made  the  master  of  modern  genre-painting. 

C,l3intnrictl)io.  A portrayer  of  the  manners  and  cos- 
tumes of  his  day  in  scenes  of  wonderful  decorative  quahty. 

c,  Subscribers  are  advised  to  renew  expiring  subscriptions 
promptly,  that  their  tiles  of  the  magazine  may  not  be  broken. 


Prospectus  ‘Masters  in  Music’  for  1904 

BATES  & GUILD  COMPANY,  BOSTON,  PUBLISHERS 


the  continued  editorship  of  Mr.  Daniel 
Gregory  Mason  ‘ Masters  in  Music  ’ will,  dur- 
ing  I Q04,  follow  the  same  plan,  and  include  all 
the  features  that  have  already  won  it  a distinctive 
place  among  musical  publications. 

Cl  t is,  however,  already  assured  that  the  numbers  of  the 
second  year  will  surpass  those  of  the  first  in  value  and  at- 
toctiveness.  Not  only  are  the  musicians  to  be  treated  com- 
posers whose  works  are  of  exceptional  interest,  but  the 
experience  gained  will  enable  the  Editor  and  Publishers  to 
produce  numbers  of  still  firmer  grasp  and  more  readable  in- 
terest. 

^[_In  general  appearance  the  magazine,  which  has  been 
called  “the  aristocrat  of  musical  productions,”  will  con- 
tinue unchanged;  and  the  two  volumes  into  which  the  1 904 
issues  will  be  divided  may  be  bound  uniform  with  those  ot 
the  first  year,  thus  putting  subscribers  in  possession  of  a mu- 
sical library  of  unique  value.  Subscription  price,  $z.oo  a 
year  for  1 2 monthly  numbers. 


Among  composers  to 

BE  TREATED  DURING 
THE  YEAR  MAY  BE  NAMED 

C,fOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH.  Often  called  “ the 
musici.in’s  composer.”  The  great  fugal  writer  who  estab- 


lished modern  harmony.  A master  of  counterpoint  and  the 
great  master  of  church  music. 

C,  FRANZ  PETER  SCHUBERT.  After  Mozart  the 
most  genial,  spontaneous,  and  melodious  o5  composers. 

C,  KARL  MARIA  von  WEBER.  The  creator  of 
“Romantic”  opera;  the  most  brilliant  of  operatic  masters, 
and  the  forerunner  of  Wagner. 

FRANZ  LISZT.  The  great  pioneer  in  pianistic  effects. 

ANTONIN  DVORAK.  Founder  of  the  Bohemian 
school  of  music.  A master  of  the  dance  element  in  music, 
who  glorified  and  made  classic  the  native  folk  music  of  Bo- 
hemia, and  did  the  same  for  American  negro  melodies. 

ROBERT  FRANZ.  One  of  Germany’s  greatest  lyri- 
cal composers,  who  brought  the  German  lied  to  a high  artis- 
tic development. 

C,THE  SCARLATTIS.  Quaint,  old-fashioned  writers 
for  the  clavichord,  the  precursor  of  the  modern  piano. 

c The  remaining  numbers  (among  which  may  now  be 
named  one  upon  IRISH  FOLK-SONGS,  giving  examples 
of  the  beautiful  and  highly  expressive  folk  music  of  Ireland) 
will  be  of  no  less  interest  and  variety  than  those  mentioned 
above.  Send  for  minature  number  and  full  prospectus. 


4 4 R 


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